The recording media such as optical recording medium, semiconductor memory, magnetic recording medium and the like can store various kinds of information such as music content, video content, text, etc. Thus, if there is available an apparatus capable of recording and reproducing data different in format from each other, the user of the apparatus can record or reproduce a music content to or from one of such recording media he or she carries with him, while recording video data captured using a digital camera or the like to the recording medium.
Since it is of course that such a recording medium is limited in capacity, so the user cannot record all new acquired information to the recording medium. When the remaining recording capacity of the recording medium becomes small, the user should delete old information recorded in the recording medium in order to have, in the recording medium, a recording area for such new information or should give up additionally recording the new information if he cannot have any recording area in the recording medium.
Once information has been deleted from the recording medium, however, if the recording/reproducing apparatus can be connected to any external device such as a personal computer or the like, for example, the user has to re-acquire the information once deleted by remembering what the information was and searching in the external device thus connected to the recording/reproducing apparatus.
Recently, a content managing method called “check-out and check-in” is used as an example of the copyright protection technology. Different from a content managing method in which a content is simply copied between recording media or between apparatuses, this “checkout and check-in” method is to move and copy a content between recording media or apparatuses or permit the right of using the content within a range of predetermined conditions. For example, in this copyright protection technology, it is defined that a content recorded in one apparatus may be brought out from the apparatus to another apparatus or a recording medium a predetermined number of times and used until the predetermined number of times is counted up. In some cases, the copyright protection technology is applied such that a content for which the right of use is checked out from one apparatus (this is called “check-out”) may be used in a destination apparatus or recording medium, while it may not be used in the one apparatus until the right of use is returned (this is called “check in”). Also, there has been proposed a technology in which when a counted number of times of check-out exceeds a limited number of times, it is inhibited to copy a content any more (cf. Japanese Patent No. 2000-315177).
The user having purchased a content whose copyright is thus protected should be able to use the content by checking it out to another apparatus unless the above-mentioned limited number of times is counted up. In the above case, namely, when a new content has to be recorded and any old content has to be deleted, if a content checked out from a host apparatus such as a personal computer or the like is deleted in a destination apparatus, the content cannot be checked in and the number of times of check-out will remain as it is when the host apparatus is next put in connection. In such a case, if the number of times of check-out exceeds the limited number of times, the deleted content will not be usable at the recording/reproducing apparatus. Also, the checked-out content cannot be used at the host apparatus or cannot be checked out again to another apparatus.